Nollaig shona duit.

For next year. For this, happy St Stephen's Day.

I hope you had an enjoyable dinner on the big day, and i want to say, thank you very much to all here who contribute to making this mirror of literacy reflect successfully since August 1, Lughansa, end of summer.

And now, just passed the threshold of midwinter, darkening days lightening up and the first wave of fight and craic gone, recorded in epic battles between our verbal protagonists doing it for positions taken and took; played out in the arena of ID and ego with the intensity all committed campaigners find leads to eloquent voices, the early hard work is done and humanity has a chance of routing through here in 2008 to drive up parity between bloggers; now at an all time high; the elevated address of one way traffic hacking detached no longer, but slipping fast in a two way communication we alone have, each singular one of us within i, You it, us and them; one and Dr Strange love in the cleera wave coming home to us, cuchulainn's ice-kept Answerer culling the crud, copping on to sorrow in the acoustic proof between faltering syllables singing happy christmas, love and peace in the new year ahead of us, please be to God.

And if anyone's on a downer, talk here, say owt yer wunt, get it off your chest and reverse the vibe by writing out the sorrow for happiness to come.

I had a low key quiet day, waking in the attic to brilliant sunshine, feeling at peace. Yesterday I got a puncture at 4pm, just i was on the way to the supermarket to buy food, which scuppered my plans for cycling to my sisters the following day; but luckily, with help from a friend, i managed to secure a repair kit and managed to be on the road by 2.30pm.

By this time it had clouded over, an undecided squall coming in, the threaten and retreat of a light nasty wind taunting beneath a pearl grey sky of low cloud dispensing random spits and pulses of rain; proof of which was left in at least two of the distinct geometrical rain symbols i witnessed as i slogged, unfit under the chaos, en route yo my sisters house for dinner, seven miles distant via a curving path along the shoreline of Dublin Bay.

As i rounded the immediate corner from the seven bedroom townhouse whose attic is mine, i was struck by an almost perfectly formed four by eight patch of rain water, as though someone had taken great care to create it. Of course it was but a chance fall from heaven, and as i cycled into the city, i noticed another rectangle, its wing-brushed perimeter of sheer random art Creation left in almost impossible odds; eerie in a spiritually comforting way.

And at Christchurch, a wet patch in the perfect shape of Jesus's face..ha ha, naah, but another distinct rectangular deposit of water, the surrounding pavement, wind-dry, a fluke displaying the order of rhyme and reason for here being here.

And all the way on out from the city up to Sutton along the coastal cycle path, a sustained downpour hovered on the brink, and burst into a 40 minute storm the minute i went indoors.

I took my place at the table and began stuffing my gob wondering at the coincidence of these two symbols and one event, gifting faith in poetry if nothing else, and when i left a few hours later, the stars were out again, me in my imagination a fili doing psychic battle with the elemental material concern above, which the gods could tip anytime on my noggin.

Then, i weft off and met the friend whose compassion saved my Christmas with a rubber and glue innertube fix yesterday, and who came round for a few hours this evening for food and boring company, and after seeing them safely home and saying au revoir, am now ready to snooze...

But in the meantime, what have you been up to this day? Any tears and tantrums, superb prezzies, crap gifts, rubbish jokes, granda arrested for telling the kids the truth about father christmas, what's on telly, inside your mind, God or no god, deal it here..

grá agus síocháin.